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A review by mxsallybend
The Dragons of Deepwood Fen by Bradley P. Beaulieu
2.0
This book and I . . . well, we had issues.
For starters, it's a cold, sterile, matter-of-fact fantasy tale with no sense of wonder or delight. Even the dragons are as about as exciting as a mangy old dog. Maybe I expected too much from the cover blurb, or too much from Beaulieu himself, given that I enjoyed his Song of the Shattered Sands series, but this just didn't engage me.
Next, it's one of those multi-POV books where there's overlap between some narrators, but no immediate connections between others. That means the story jumps around, sacrificing whatever tension or curiosity it's nurtured to a new thread. It's just not a style I generally enjoy.
In addition, this feels like a book that doesn't know what it wants to be. It has epic fantasy roots wrapped up in low fantasy trappings, with something of a grimdark flavor, but the plot is largely centered around a police procedural involving drug trafficking. Ugh, no thank you - I read to escape that mindless drivel on TV, not to explore it in a different setting.
Finally, the pacing of this was atrociously slow, owing in large part to the multiple POVs. You'd expect the events of the cover blurb to come early, to be the tease that launches you into the story, but I DNF'd this at about the halfway mark and we still hadn't encountered those events.
All of that said, Beaulieu is a talented writer and I'm sure this will find an audience, it's just not me.
https://sallybend.wordpress.com/2023/11/01/book-review-the-dragons-of-deepwood-fen-by-bradley-p-beaulieu-fantasy/
For starters, it's a cold, sterile, matter-of-fact fantasy tale with no sense of wonder or delight. Even the dragons are as about as exciting as a mangy old dog. Maybe I expected too much from the cover blurb, or too much from Beaulieu himself, given that I enjoyed his Song of the Shattered Sands series, but this just didn't engage me.
Next, it's one of those multi-POV books where there's overlap between some narrators, but no immediate connections between others. That means the story jumps around, sacrificing whatever tension or curiosity it's nurtured to a new thread. It's just not a style I generally enjoy.
In addition, this feels like a book that doesn't know what it wants to be. It has epic fantasy roots wrapped up in low fantasy trappings, with something of a grimdark flavor, but the plot is largely centered around a police procedural involving drug trafficking. Ugh, no thank you - I read to escape that mindless drivel on TV, not to explore it in a different setting.
Finally, the pacing of this was atrociously slow, owing in large part to the multiple POVs. You'd expect the events of the cover blurb to come early, to be the tease that launches you into the story, but I DNF'd this at about the halfway mark and we still hadn't encountered those events.
All of that said, Beaulieu is a talented writer and I'm sure this will find an audience, it's just not me.
https://sallybend.wordpress.com/2023/11/01/book-review-the-dragons-of-deepwood-fen-by-bradley-p-beaulieu-fantasy/